


somebody to lean on

by Waistcoat35



Series: they slipped briskly into an intimacy from which they never recovered [8]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:01:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24672019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waistcoat35/pseuds/Waistcoat35
Summary: "Take my seat."
Relationships: Thomas Barrow/Richard Ellis
Series: they slipped briskly into an intimacy from which they never recovered [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1772770
Comments: 4
Kudos: 78





	somebody to lean on

Richard settles in with the newspaper as he waits for Thomas to drag a chair over. He'd come into the servants' hall during the hours after the Downstairs dinner and found all of the chairs occupied, a good number of them put in another room to make space for when some of the maids had wanted to dance to a song on the wireless. He had turned to go and fetch one when Thomas had stood up, stretched like a lazy housecat, and tilted his head to the rocking chair he'd just vacated.

"Go on - take my seat." 

Richard had been surprised - it was a lot of faff for Thomas to leave his chair and get another when he was already sat down. But there had been an insistent, earnest look on his face that he only gets when he really means something, or when the something means more than Richard thinks, and so he had accepted.

Daisy passes through with more pots for the sink, and he's going to draw in his legs (which are 'freakishly long' according to Thomas) so as not to trip her when she just steps over them with a long stride that suggests she's done it a hundred times before. She turns as if to say something to him, and then stops short, looking amazed. Richard tilts his head. 

"Something the matter?" She shakes her head vigourously as if trying to clear it of cobwebs, bob cut bouncing comically just above her shoulders, and adjusts her grip on the dishes. 

"No, it's not that, only just...well, I didn't expect to be seeing you there, Mr Ellis. It's always Mr Barrow what sits there, that's all - I'd turned to tell him something before I even realised. Having to step over you didn't help, either - he might be shorter than you but he doesn't half sprawl when he wants to make a nuisance of himself." 

Richard raises his eyebrows. "Oh?" 

"Yeah. I don't know why, really, it's just the one he's always used. Even Jimmy used to clear out of it if Thomas came in, knowing he'd want to sit there." (Richard tries not to feel a tiny stab of victory at that, at the fact that Thomas has actively made room for him where someone else didn't have that. Then he just feels a bit daft for being smug about someone who never became more than Thomas' friend, and who hasn't been here in several years, lacking Richard's Chair Privileges.) 

Daisy goes on her way, called back by Mrs Patmore, and Richard takes to examining the book review column for the week until he hears wood scraping against the floor and glances up to see Thomas has returned, closer than Richard thought he'd dare. He has sprawled out as much as Daisy had predicted, and it would only take Richard stretching his legs out again for their shins to intertwine. He stretches, and Thomas looks indescribably pleased with himself as Richard interlocks their ankles. 

"Daisy came by," Richard says conversationally. "Wanted to tell you something, didn't even know it was me sitting here until she looked up at my face." Thomas feigns a polite sort of disinterest (which Richard would previously not have thought to be possible, but Thomas has mastered a look that tells you that he's terribly sorry, but you're really not that interesting, and he can hardly help it at all, can't be blamed for not being able to listen to boring people.) Richard, however, can read Thomas like a book - a beloved childhood paperback, perhaps, dog-eared and worn and greyed with its dust jacket constantly patched - the kind of book one feels could be given to them in upside-down hieroglyphics and still be legible. Loved and kept and revered so long and so dearly that it can't hide anything. 

"Did she?"

"Yes."

"Mm." Apparently the bottom of Thomas' teacup is fascinating. 

"She said this was your chair. Specifically your chair." Thomas reddens.

"She might've-"

"You can have it back if you want. No need to make room for me." He winced at how it sounds - apologetic, polite, silly. 

Thomas shakes his head. "I haven't," he says, and Richard's heard sinks for one moment, before -

"You," Thomas says, "have managed to take up so much bloody space in my heart and my mind - as much as the first one's too cold and the second one's too sharp - that it's every bleeding thing else that I have to make room for around you." 

Richard swallows. "I-" 

"And I wouldn't change it for the world." 

He smiles softly. "Giving up your chair for me, though?" 

Thomas glances off to the side awkwardly. "Read an article the other day," he edges, and in that wonderful habit he's picked up, 'the other day' could be any time from actually yesterday to a few months back.

"Said rocking chairs are good for the back."

Oh, _bless_ him. Richard thinks of the injury that dogs him after lifting things or in the cold, the one he's dragged around for twelve years.

"Sweet thing, aren't you," he says quietly, almost crooning it, and Thomas blushes more, scowls at the fireplace.

"M'not sweet." Richard smirks.

"We'll see about that." 


End file.
